Virtual Reality

We’ve been working on this tech since the 1830’s and we’re almost to the point of mass adoption and use cases…

Magic Leap today revealed a mixed reality headset that it believes reinvents the way people will interact with computers and reality. Unlike the opaque diver’s masks of virtual reality, which replace the real world with a virtual one, Magic Leap’s device, called Lightwear, resembles goggles, which you can see through as if wearing a special pair of glasses. The goggles are tethered to a powerful pocket-sized computer, called the Lightpack, and can inject life-like moving and reactive people, robots, spaceships, anything, into a person’s view of the real world.

Developed by Microsoft’s research division, Tay is a virtual friend with behaviors informed by the web chatter of some 18–24-year-olds and the repartee of a handful of improvisational comedians (Microsoft declined to name them). Her purpose, unlike AI-powered virtual assistants like Facebook’s M, is almost entirely to amuse. And Tay does do that: She is simultaneously entertaining, infuriating, manic, and irreverent.

Throughout his career, Bowie pushed the boundaries of music from all angles: His public persona constantly evolved as he shifted genres like a time traveler’s temporal jumps. He also wasn’t afraid to grasp at the future of business: He launched an ISP called BowieNet in 1998, saying at the time, “If I was 19 again, I’d bypass music and go right to the internet.”

Saving this for when we look back in 10 years on the first mainstream uses of VR in much the same way we fondly look back at web pages from the 90’s today…

“Today, The New York Times takes a step into virtual reality. NYT VR is a mobile app that can be used — along with your headphones and optionally a cardboard viewing device — to simulate richly immersive scenes from across the globe.”